Results are in...

My first post-treatment CT scan was performed last Thursday, October 10th.  I have been developing a mild allergic reaction to the iodine-based IV contrast that they administer during the CT scan, so I have to take a Prednisone regimen starting 12 hours before.  That seems to halt the allergic reaction that I have been experiencing when I get a CT scan.  It's hard for me to hold my head still when I get the overwhelming urge to unleash one hell of a violent sneeze when they run the contrast through my body.  Anyway, the scan itself went off without a hitch, just had to drive in to Houston to get it done.

Still no real beard re-growth to speak of, so all I have to do with myself these days is mess around with this ridiculous mustache.  I only say ridiculous because I absolutely HATE being unable to grow any hair on my chin and left side of my face.  It sucks.  I can, at least, style my mustache with official mustache wax (thanks Jessica)!  Bowen and A.J. seem to get a pretty big kick out of it, so at least there is some entertainment value associated with it.
Physically everything seems to be getting better or has already fully recovered.  I seem to be tired all the time, but that is probably just a result of doing nothing for month at a time so I will have to work on elevating my energy levels.  I think my taste is getting better, but there still are things that don't taste right or just don't taste at all.  Sweet, carbonated beverages are a no-go, but I don't really need those anyway.  I find it interesting the way my mouth reacts to different foods.  Sweet things, in general, leave a nasty taste and funky feeling inside my mouth.  I believe that I am starting to taste salty foods a little more, but I think it has to be VERY salty for me to pick out that taste.  Everything tends to taste sweet to me, so there are still some improvements that can be made with my taste sensation.  Eating is still a bit more of a challenge than it used to be and I find that I have to brush and floss after eating anything or my mouth gets all funky.  I guess this whole ordeal has at least improved my overall habits dealing with oral hygiene.  That is a plus.
I had a follow up with my ENT surgeon last Friday for my monthly scoping!  That is always a pleasant experience.  3 second shots of a lidocaine mist in each nostril followed by a camera going in the left nostril until it reaches the magic spot whereby it produces an uncontrollable gag reflex.  Then a bunch of pictures are taken of various things while I am told to make various 'aaaaaaahs' and 'oooooooooos' in between my guttural gagging noises.  Nothing to it!  That is all followed with the standard, "everything looks good and I will see you in a month!" and then out the door I go.  In addition to this appointment, I also had appointments this week with my radiation oncologist and my medical oncologist.  I think the appointment with my medical oncologist was my favorite, as he was the only one to NOT stick a camera up my nose and down into my throat.  I was not expecting much of anything as far as major news goes and I would say that it lived up to what I was expecting.  What I want them to say is that it is gone and I can go about my business as usual and just focus on getting better.  I did receive some bad news in the mix in that my radiation oncologist does not think my beard will ever come back.  I hope that I can prove him wrong.  The results of the scan indicate something abnormal on the left hand side in my neck, but it is unknown as of this point in time.  Their recommended action is to let things continue healing and have another scan in 3 months to see what it looks like then.  It could be a treated lymph node, scar tissue, residual disease, etc...  Basically it could be anything, good or bad.  They are not overly concerned with it as it did not change in size in the scan from before treatment to the ones after treatment.  I would imagine this is what I will be hearing for a while now until something changes for better or for worse.  I hope that it is for the better.
On the brighter side, I am going to try making authentic Bavarian Pretzels this coming weekend.  Also going to make about 20 lbs of Bratwurst and grinding meat and making sausage always makes me feel better.  

a month worth of "normal"

It has been a while now since I have updated interested parties on my condition.  At the time of my last post, I was "peaking" at my low point.  I didn't know it at the time, but at that point the worst was pretty much behind me.  Now, here it is exactly 4 weeks after I finished my treatments and things have seemingly calmed down.  I now have about a month off from any and all visits to the doctor and that is a nice feeling right now.  October 10th I will go back for my first CT scan post-treatment which will serve as a baseline for all further CT scans.  I don't anticipate much coming from this first CT scan unless something dramatic shows up.  After the 10th, I will go see both the medical oncologist and the radiation oncologist the following week.  
I went last week and had blood work done and saw the medical oncologist to go over what those results were.  As of last week all my blood cell counts were back to normal and he told me that everything was looking good in my recovery.  I have also begun to feel much, much better on a daily basis.  The only real problem I am dealing with these days is pain in my jaw and left side of my face when I eat solid food.  The pain is actually quite intense, so I am still somewhat limited in what I can eat.  My surgeon put me on some anti-inflammatory medicine and a muscle relaxer as well to see if that helps.  Thus far, it has been doing a good job of lessening the severity of the pain when I eat, so I am optimistic that when I am off the medicine the pain should be more manageable.  I still don't have much taste when it comes to food, but I am feeling that in the last couple of days more and more flavors are recognizable and I hope that is a sign that my taste is coming back.  Other than the eating pain and some lingering fatigue all seems to be headed in the right direction.  I am still incapable of going with a full beard as the hair has not started coming back at all for most of my face, but I am hopeful that it returns someday.  Now, I can simply concentrate on growing the best mustache I can and getting some beard balm so that I can style it like a professional.
To sum it all up, I am still alive and very happy to be so.  Hopefully I have many more years to look forward to, regardless of the condition of my facial hair.  As the days since finishing treatment continue to grow, I am filled with more and more hope that I can put this all behind me and focus on what is ahead.  Goodnight for now, more to come...

Hump day

It has now been one week since I finished up and what a week it was.  Now that I am actually taking my pain pills, I can deal with the pain levels but I don't function that well when taking hydrocodone every 4 hours.  Lots of sleeping in my future as long as this course holds true.  I will take sleeping all day versus the pain I was in over the last weekend, however, so I guess I will just have to make due.
My neck seems to be healing up quite nicely.  I am down to only applying aquaphor to my actual scar line and I am hoping in a couple of days I won't even need it there.  The skin that has been exposed to radiation is always going to be funky, though.  I think it will look like a healed burned area, but time will tell.  While the neck continues to get better, the inside of my mouth continues to get worse.  Maybe it is due to swelling tissue and more sores, but I continue to struggle to eat and drink normally.  If I can keep the food on the right side of my mouth throughout the whole process, I can usually get some solid food into my body.  It is definitely a slow process, however, but one of vital importance to me if I want continue healing quickly.  I partook of three actual meals today for the first time in a week, so I am encouraged that I will be able to eat more in the coming days.  It is an interesting struggle, to know that I have to eat to get better but the act of eating is so painful and discouraging that it is hard to build up the strength to even try.  I am encouraged after today and that will help as I move forward.  I think it has been a while since I mentioned how much I hate the daily fluoride treatments that I have to do at night before I go to bed.  I hate them very much.  That is all I have to say about that.
One bright spot in my day is that I get to go with Bowen and A.J. to school and I am there to get them in the afternoon when they get out of school.  Today we rode bikes to school and that is the plan for tomorrow.  My doctor did tell me that a little bit of exercise is good for my recovery and it is about all I can do to make it to and from the school on my bike and then I am knocked out for a while, but in the end I think it is good for me.  Regardless, I count myself lucky that I get some extra time and activities with my sons that I normally would not get had I simply been at work all day.
I think that is about it and I just got extremely dizzy and lightheaded so I think that means I should go to sleep.  One day closer to feeling better.

Ouch!

Wow.
Very soon after the euphoria of finally finishing treatment subsided, the seriousness of my situation was very quick to return.  It was such a great feeling to finally be finished with the everyday treatments and I really had not experienced all that much in the way of severe side effects so I imagine that I let my guard down a little and thought I might squeak by and return to normal life relatively quickly.  I believe the celebration a bit premature and I am once again humbled by the severity of what my body has been subjected to.  I am also extremely grateful that I only received the considerable dosage of radiation to only the left side of my head and neck.  I cringe in horror to think that the pain that I feel now would be doubled and on both sides of my throat, mouth and neck.  I can, without a doubt, say that last weekend was the most miserable 2-3 day stretch of my entire life and I don't feel like it is getting better as of yet.  Everything I read warned me to be ready for a couple weeks of hell after finishing treatment and prior to any significant recovery, and that has definitely been the case thus far.  Maybe my body has been able to fight off the effects that normally start plaguing people 3 weeks into treatment and delayed the onset until after I finished, or the cumulative effects have just built up to the point now where I am unable to cope as I could just a week ago.
Overall, there is much more pain now and it has increased substantially over the past week and is very much affecting normal day-to-day activities.  Every swallow sends tendrils of intense pain through the left half of my throat and just talking has become something of a struggle.  In addition to the throat pain, the existing sores in my mouth have become more painful and have been joined by an ever increasing number of friends that make my days oh-so miserable.  Keeping up with my mouth care and water intake and food intake has become a struggle that I am fighting a losing battle with each day.  It seems like such an easy thing, to drink water or to rinse my mouth out or to even eat some cantaloupe.  I agree that these things SEEM like easy activities, but the fire in my mouth and throat have different ideas about what is easy and what is extremely difficult.  I spent most of the weekend not taking my pain pills as I was also dealing with nasty side effects from those pills and I needed some time to work things out.  In hindsight, that was probably a bad idea, but I felt it needed to be done.  Solid food is becoming more difficult to eat, to the point that Jessica picked me up a whole lot of Ensure at the store today (thank you!).  I believe that I will be taking in the majority of my calories in the foreseeable future in liquid form.
Anyway, I think that is about it for right now.  I will try to write more in the coming days, and I am super pumped for one thing today and that is the arrival of my newest shirt.  It looks like this:

  

Finished (a quickie)

A quick note this afternoon to commemorate the fact that my treatment is DONE!  Eight weeks from now, I will have another high contrast head/neck CT scan that will serve as my baseline from here on out.  I wanted to put a bunch of pictures here of the wonderful people at the MD Anderson Regional Care Facility in Katy, the ones that have put up with me for the past 7 weeks plus.  THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Veronica-fresh off some vacation!

Mary-doing what she does best!

Sheryl-multitasking at its finest!

I thought also I would share something my mother sent me this morning that really connected with me on this wonderful day...
My health has been tested:
I am in a limbo of not knowing.
Let me not hasten to conclusions:
the condition of my body
is beyond my understanding.
My life is not suspended:
it continues as before.
The spirit is undimmed.

We cannot expect perfection.
We can only hope to continue.

The spirit leases a beautiful house
in the earthquake zone.

Thanks to the Divine for the strength
to be patient.

Dr. Chronowski and Nurse Kim

Linda-radiation treatment guru.

Platelets rising

And after a week off from chemo, the verdict is in!  Platelets rebounded from 74,000 last week to around 165,000 this morning.  Now their big concern is my white blood cell count, which will leave me more susceptible to infection and sickness but they went ahead and gave me the final chemo this morning.  I am very relieved to have this final dose administered and also very happy that my chemo treatment is now finished.  It should be an interesting couple of weeks now that I have had my final chemo and am about to finish up radiation.  I am now taking my pain pill every 4 hours or so and then my nausea medicine will be every 8 hours.  The silver lining with some of this pain business is that I can't feel my neck since the first surgery and I think that if I did have feeling this pain would be exponentially worse.  Gnarly neck seems to be getting worse and the pain in my mouth is also increasing in magnitude.  The mouth issues are making it increasingly difficult to eat and it even affects my ability to intake liquids.  Liquids irritate the sores that are currently in my mouth, mostly on the left side of my tongue.  Talking also irritates it, so I have to keep that to a minimum (which totally goes against all the fibers of my being).  I spend the majority of my days laying in my bed and dozing in and out of consciousness.  Fatigue is a constant these days and it is a difficult side effect to ignore.
I got to ring the chemo bell today surrounded by the nurses that were there when I finished up.  It is was a great feeling to know that I will not have to go back there (not for now, at least) and my treatment is complete.  They make a big deal out of finishing and it helps makes the end of the process special.  If it wasn't for that ridiculous mustache and mangled neck and shoulder area, I would probably feel really good about the whole deal.  After chemo it was off to grab a bite to eat and I was able to power down quite a decent amount of food.  
The best part of the day came at about 7 pm, when UPS delivered my final day t-shirt.  I will be the first to report that it does not disappoint.  WOW.  I may be a little biased based on the simple fact that I picked it out, but I feel that I have really nailed it with this shirt.  It really ties the process together.  Not sure exactly yet on what bottoms I should pair with it, but regardless I think the shirt speaks for itself.  My plan is to take a sharpie and have all the people that have been involved with my treatment sign the shirt and really have something to commemorate the event.  Time to sign off for the day and try to get some rest, but I don't know how well I will sleep.  The steroid I get tends to keep me up the night of chemo and the pain doesn't let me sleep much anyway.  Good times are ahead.

The final countdown

We shall start off with the good that happened over this past weekend, that being Bowens first foray into an actual soccer tournament.  His team didn't win the whole thing, but he played amazingly  and was definitely one of the main reasons that they did as well as they did.  I am so very proud of him when he is out there giving it his all and I can't wait to see what sports he settles in on and the experiences that await him in all his pursuits.  He had two games Saturday and one on Sunday and while it was great to get out for a little while, it also served as a good reminder that I still have a long way to go before this while thing is finished.

Other than the tournament, the weekend was not all that great from my perspective.  I had to start taking pain pills, which I hate to do, but the pain level really started to ramp up on Friday and didn't really let up at all by Saturday.  It is mainly pain in the base of my neck and shoulder on the left hand side that get significant radiation and then my mouth is starting to bother me much more as well.  I will say that I am glad that I don't have feeling in the majority of my neck, because I imagine that the pain would be much worse if that were the case.  My neck has become very stiff and the mobility of my head is very much impacted.  When I don't have Aquaphor on my neck it feels like the skin is going to split in half when I turn my head.  The mouth issues are getting bad enough that it is very much impacting my eating, but we are working through what I can and can't eat on a daily basis.  I have found some vegetable dishes that I am a big fan of and the ageless classic of Campbells Chicken Noodle Soup is becoming a staple.  

Gnarly neck

Words can not begin to express the feelings that I am having now that I am only two days away from finishing.  When I started, it felt like this would never end and now that the end is here, I can't believe how quickly it went.  It is also weird to think about waking up Thursday and NOT having to go in for radiation.  I am now filled with these feelings of 'OK, now what??'.  It just feels like I am once again entering into the undefined realm of the unknown and I suppose the prospect of that is a bit scary for me again.  I want for this to be the end of it.  I want my beard back.  I want the pain to stop.  I want, I want, I want...  I sound a lot like A.J. right about now.

On to the big news of the day...I now have my shirt picked out that I am going to wear for my final day of radiation on Wednesday.  It is amazing and I think that everyone there is going to very much enjoy it.  Consider yourself lucky, dear blog reader, for you now get a sneak peak at what I have in store for them.  AND HOW!!!!

Blah!

We have officially less than one week until I am finished!  Only 4 more treatments and I can ring my bell and move on with my life.  I am really starting to drag these last few days and I can only imagine that it is going to get worse.  Complete lack of energy and where I do have feeling on my upper shoulder/neck/head area, the radiation is seriously burning my skin.  It also severely stiffens the muscles of my neck, so movement is a little more difficult and slow.  My radiation treatment shortened by about 5 minutes this morning when they cut out the final electron step.  I am also not sure if it is from the platelet loss or one of the many other aspects of my blood that are out of whack, but I am cold all the time.  It actually is kind of a useful trait to have here in Houston right now since we are approaching solar surface temperatures these days.
I am still finding it increasingly difficult to make myself eat.  Something about the mechanics of it are bothering me, but I can' exactly tell what it is.  Maybe it is because my tongue is swollen and hurts a bit when I have to use it to move food around to chew it.  Whatever it is, it is becoming more difficult.  I am still eating, though and hopefully things will start getting better in a couple of weeks.  Jessica is doing an awesome job of making things that are easy for me to eat and that don't have anything too offensive in it so I can keep getting something in me every night.  It also gets harder and harder every day to force down the water and I have started trying to add in some decaffeinated iced tea so that I have at least something else that I can drink.  Intensely sweet things now taste horrific to me.  I tried a sip of root beer the other day and it was disgusting.  That and cream cheese icing are the two things thus far that the taste has changed for the worse.  I can still power down a chocolate milk shake like a champ, so there is still hope.
My picture today is of a hairless bear and gives some insight in to how I feel out in the everyday world without my beard.  Just as bears should be covered with a magnificent coat of hair, so too should my face be covered with a spectacular display of hairy goodness.  Without it, we both look out of place, disturbing and completely unnatural.  

Only 5 more!

Such a glorious day today!  As of right now, I only have 5 more radiation treatments to undergo before my treatment is complete.  I can not express how much of a relief this simple fact is to me right now.  Showed up this morning for treatment and the two lovely ladies that work the front desk asked me if anyone had called me.  That is usually not a good sign, but I forged ahead as I don't want to tack on any more treatments because I miss some along the way.  Both machines were down this morning and the waiting room was overflowing with people waiting to receive their morning radiation burn.  Today is my day to meet with the doctor, so I went around the corner to initiate that process so that was at least out of the way and then I could just wait for radiation.  Before I see the radiation oncologist, I am subjected to an barrage of physical tests to assess my condition.  Weight (104 kg), body temperature, standing blood pressure and the final in the series, sitting blood pressure.  After successfully passing all those tests, it was off to see the doctor.  Nothing new came out of the doctor visit.  Just stay the course and it will get worse before it gets better.  When done with the doctor, it was back over to the radiation waiting area where they had at least gotten my normal machine up and working so they were slowly working their way through patients.  I finally was called back at about 10:30 am, a mere 2 hours after my scheduled 8:30 time-slot.  I was happy to wait, however, as I DO NOT want to extend my treatment past next Wednesday.  The treatment took a bit longer than normal as they worked around certain aspects of the machine that were still inoperable.  (It had nothing to do with the actual radiation, the biggest issue is they have a auxiliary x-ray head on the machine that they take the setup x-rays with for positioning and they could not use that, so they had to use the main machine head to do all the positioning and it takes longer that way)  Only thing of note today is that my skin is really showing the effects of the radiation burn, especially the scar line and the back of my shoulder is all torn up from it.

I had an awesome surprise waiting for me at work that I had no idea had been in the works for a while now.  A couple of my friends at work organized an awesome support rally for me that occurred yesterday, on a Tuesday when they knew I would be out for the day.  My sailing buddy brought in his boat and launched it in one of the ponds at work as a backdrop to their festivities and to show his sailing prowess, actually tacked a couple times across the very, very small pond.  The have also inspired the next brew, whenever I can actually do that again, Sailin' Stobb IPA will come to life and perhaps be a mainstay in the garage fridge as I move forward.  They got everybody to wear bald caps and large, fake beards and they drank (root)beer from an array of awesome steins.  Included was an awesome shirt for everybody that is depicted at right.  It was an awesome show of support from a group of people that mean a great deal to me, and I hope that I can express to them my utmost gratitude for what they have done.  It could not have come at a better time, as the days begin to wear on me hopefully this is the final push I need to make it through next week and beyond.  Thank you to everyone involved in this, and thank you to anyone who prayed for/with me and to all those who have kept me in their thoughts as I have continued through this journey.  I don't know that I will every be able to repay all the support that I have received, but I will start with this:  THANK YOU!

Platelets Down!

Whole lot of mixed feelings filled this 2nd to last Tuesday of my treatment cycle.  As is the routine every Tuesday, I went in first thing to the lab and had my blood drawn.  Then an uneventful round of radiation, although I did learn on fantastic fact.  Tomorrow is my last full version of radiation.  The machine hits me at 10 different positions with radiation, with the 10th and final requiring additional setup and it hits my old scar on the right side of my neck with electrons.  Tomorrow will be my last dose of that for the duration, so my treatment will actually be shorter come Thursday.  That was nice to hear and it is really starting to feel like I am about to finish this whole ordeal.  I also met with the medical oncologist and was informed that my platelets are too low and they would not be administering the Cisplatin for this week.  He also made it sound like I probably would not be getting it next week, but at this point I will come back in and get bloodwork done to see if I can have it next week.  That's where the mixed feelings come in.  I am feeling worse and worse and so not having the chemo this week is nice to let me hopefully recover some, but I also would rather have gone through the whole treatment schedule without missing any.  Nothing can be done now, so I will just hope that 5 chemo cycles will be sufficient, and the doctor seems to think that should be more than enough for me.
I have been very tired all the time this past week and my writing has suffered.  I have not felt like doing it and so I took a break.  I hope to be better about it in the next couple of weeks and so I am forcing myself to write this.  It is a crazy feeling for me to feel THIS tired all of the time.  Now along with the tired, I have a constant sick feeling in my stomach that is making it harder and harder to eat.  I still don't have very horrible mouth side effects, so I am optimistic for the rest of the time that I will still miss out on the intense sore throat and mouth sores.  Again, I feel very fortunate that I have been spared from some of the more severe side effects and to still be feeling so well this far into treatment.  My weight is still pretty good, it is dropping somewhat but nothing that concerns them enough to verbally reprimand me and tell me to eat more.  I am starting to have some shooting pains in the side of my face and my lower left jaw that are bothersome, but still manageable without taking anything too drastic.  
Since I shaved my beard off, I had been bothered every morning by an annoying tickle type of sensation on my chin during treatments when I am strapped down to the table with my mask on and my arms restrained.  That is somewhat troublesome when I am laying there unable to move or do anything about it.  I realized last Friday what it was when I looked at my mask after they took it off.  They have a series of taped areas all around the mask that show alignment marks and such, and stuck to much of this tape were many remnants of my once glorious beard.  Little hairs were sticking out everywhere from the mask and were the source of my ever-growing frustrations as I lay immobilized on the table.  On Monday morning before treatment, I grabbed my mask and began the process of removing the many hairs in question.  Talk about a difference!  I can now, once again, lay there and receive my radiation without thinking that I am about to lose it.
Quick note on the platelets...I believe that I mentioned previously that the normal count is 140-400 and lets ignore the units for this discussion.  2 weeks ago I was sitting pretty at 184, then in 1 weeks time that number was cut in half to 98.  My doctors cutoff to administer chemo is 100, but he went ahead and let me take my 5th cycle.  As of today, my platelets are at 74 and he thinks they will go lower so he didn't administer.  I am hoping they rebound in the next week and I can have the final dose next Tuesday.  It was pretty amazing to me that they nose dived all of a sudden and so quickly.  I guess that stuff really is doing something to my body that is not pleasant.  One week from tomorrow, it will all be over, regardless.  I can not wait for that day, as I am ready to be done with this and move on.

Thursday is back!

After a week of relatively good feelings and experiences, once again it is Thursday that comes along to knock me back a few steps.  Don't know exactly why sometimes I feel ok, and then other times I can feel like absolute crap.  Could be due to large doses of poison that my body gets subjected to 5 days a week, or maybe it is the weather.  I could tell this morning when I woke up that I wasn't going to have the best day today.  There is just a feeling that I have at times in my stomach that somewhat forewarns me that it's not going to be that great of a day.  So I had that going for me first thing this morning, but I tried to fight through it.  I ate breakfast and then headed off to my radiation appointment.  The good news is that there is only one more Thursday radiation appointment left!  Went to work after radiation and again forced down some food during lunch, but it was quite the losing battle today.  I got progressively tired throughout the day and ended up leaving work about an hour early and headed straight home and laid down in bed.  That was about 4.  I think I woke up around 8.  The constant nausea is hanging around again, but I am working through it.  I really wanted a bagel with cream cheese when I woke up, but had to settle for an english muffin thanks to the stupid local store that I went to.  I feel better now after eating a little something and now I just need to stay up until about 11:30 to take another Ativan, in hopes it helps with my symptoms tomorrow.
That's about all I got, other than to indulge my brother and post an image of his whimsical musings about who I look like with my various facial hair styles.  I feel like I have a better mustache, brother.

Happy wednesday

In exactly two weeks from today, I will be completely finished with this treatment path.  I found out today from my radiation oncologist that after I finish treatment, we will wait 8 weeks before I get my first scan to see how we did.  It will be a CT scan of my head and neck, and then after that scan I will have one once every 3 months for the foreseeable future.  This along with my monthly visits to my ENT surgeon for my nasal probing should keep me very familiar with my good doctor buddies.  I don't know if it is the optimism surging forth from the realization that I am so much closer to finishing, but I have felt very good all day long.  I still feel tired at times and I am currently and have been for some time already laid out in my bed, but my stomach has been feeling pretty good today.  Felt good enough that after work, I came home and worked on a broken sprinkler head.  I fixed the one that was broken and felt great about that, but then broke another one in a different part of the yard.  Now I get to dig that one up and hope I can replace it.  Good times.
I am feeling very fortunate these days that my symptoms are not worse and that I seem to be handling the whole treatment regime pretty well.  I think things could be much, much worse than what I am experiencing and for that I will be eternally grateful.  The inside of my mouth is showing signs of the radiation burn, but again, it is nothing that I can't deal with right now.  I look forward to what will be a glorious day in exactly two weeks from today.

In addition to being a kick ass day, I also debuted a kick ass mustache today.  Went ahead and trimmed off the chops and left the simple, yet beautiful stand alone 'stache.  Not sure how I am going to able to fight off the throngs of women throwing themselves at my feet, but I will try to manage.  This was done at Jessica's request, perhaps she didn't know exactly the kind of power that she was about to unleash.  Look out ladies...

Only two more tuesdays

Tuesdays are the long days of the week with radiation and chemo and a doctors visit to boot.  When I meet with the doctor, it tends to mess up my schedule and I don't get out of there until mid afternoon.  For some reason the medical oncologist always seems to take forever to see me.  He did mention something interesting as it pertains to my bloodwork this week.  He told me my platelets are getting low, and if it continues I might have to skip a chemo, but I am hopeful that they rebound this week so I can get in my final 2 chemos.  My first three weeks of chemo, my platelet count was in the mid 200 K/uL, then in week 4 it dropped to 187 K/uL and so today they must have dropped further.  For reference, a normal count is 140-400 K/uL.  Not sure if they will just skip a treatment or tack it on to the end, my general feeling is that they would just skip the chemo and let me finish out with the radiation.
I felt worse today during the actual chemo treatment for the first time in this process.  Just a general malaise that lasted the majority of the two hour Cisplatin infusion and I began feeling fairly nauseous right away.  As usual, Jessica came through again with some killer lunch that I got to enjoy while being infused with my weekly poison.  That helped me feel better, but did not totally alleviate all my problems.  I waited until about 7 before I finally did take an Ativan to hopefully help ease the nausea I am starting to feel this evening.
The picture at right was taken at Blue Hole which is outside of Wimberley while the boys were spending a couple of days with their cousins in Dripping Springs.  It looks like a pretty cool place that we will definitely have to visit again soon.  The boys made it back to us this evening and we are now currently engrossed in their new movie purchase, Underdog.  Would rather be doing nothing else, I have missed them.

 

Back to it

Another Monday down, only two more of these to endure.  It has been a while since I have posted, mostly due to my lack of an internet connection up at the lake.  The other factor was the fact that I have been exhausted.  Been doing quite a bit of sleeping and not much else.  I would say that I am surprised with just how tired that I feel  on a daily basis.  I start out in the morning usually feeling pretty good, but at some point in the morning I seem to hit a wall.  The weekend consisted of lots of napping.  
As far as how I am feeling, I am doing ok.  My throat continues to worsen on the left side.  The inside of my mouth is also feeling worse, not really specific sores or anything, just a general funky feeling.  It is also drying out more and more and I have a nasty taste that seems to linger in my mouth pretty much all the time.  Taste in general is gone, at least the normal tastes that I am used to.  Sweet foods are tasting strange and leave my mouth with an additional nasty feeling.  The skin on my neck that is subjected to the radiation is starting to show the burn from all of the exposure.  Also the back of my head that get the exit dose of radiation is losing hair.  That's not that big of a deal since I sport a bald head anyway, just thought it was worthy to note.  Today was the first Monday where I just didn't want to go to radiation.  I guess it is just wearing on me, but I am just over two weeks away from finishing the actual treatments.  Just a quick note today to update my status.  Tiredness has taken hold.

It's chop time

I woke up to my face looking like the first picture here to the left.  Pretty sad when your only real goal in life is to grow a beard.  It just keeps coming out, more and more at a time so the decision has been made...it's time.  Time to grab the 'ol clippers and see what we could come up with.  The only option was to go friendly mutton chops which I affectionately call the English Sea Captain.  Have not seen my chin very often in the last 15 years, but I guess I will get used to the sight of it at some point.  Hopefully the beard will return, but right now it is time to play with some other styles.  
Radiation today was good.  I was worried when I walked in and they put the mask down over my face and clamped me down that they were going to have to make a new one.  They said they would run the x-rays and see how everything looked.  Everything worked out ok, and I don't think they will need to make me a new mask.  The bite-block I have in my mouth works well to position my lower jaw and so all should be well.  After radiation I met with my radiation oncologist for my weekly visit.  I am down about 6 lbs from the very beginning, so I get the usual talk about keeping my calories up and my hydration good and then I go along my merry way.  Again today my blood pressure was great and I have yet to have a fever through all of this, so I count myself lucky.  
I felt better today than I have in at least a week.  I don't know exactly what it is, but I hope that I can keep this going.  Been taking my anxiety pill every 8 hours, so maybe that has something to do with it, but I ate like crazy all day.  I probably took in about 2 days worth of calories, so tomorrow I might just take the day off.  Still losing my taste gradually, but I still have enough of it to enjoy the things that I am eating.  Definitely a big fan of sauces these days as I like what I eat to have a lot of moisture in it and be relatively soft.  The skin on my neck and parts of my face is starting to show the effects of the radiation.  It is turning red and will continue to get more and more red as the treatments continue.  
That is about it for now, the boys are going to the lake with my parents tomorrow, and then we will meet up with them on Friday when we get up there.  Going to take our old king size bed up to one of the houses there and just do some relaxing at the newly painted townhouse.

51.5% and 57.1%

I am now officially over halfway through my treatment schedule and I couldn't be more pleased with that fact.  Radiation was a breeze yesterday and today, but I am concerned that they are going to have to make me a new mask due to my ever disappearing beard.  Its pretty sad looking today, I am trying to moisturizing the skin underneath mainly on my chin as the skin is bothering me and seems to be dry and flaky.  Messing with the hair just makes it fall out, so I think I just need to let it go.  I think tomorrow is going to be the day of reckoning.  Stand alone 'stache with some bitchin' chops!  I just really hope that it grows back, but am resigned to the fact that my beard could very well be gone for good.  Met with the medical oncologist today before chemo and he said everything looks like it is going well...and gave me another prescription for an different anti-nausea medicine to try to see if it controls my nausea better.  He has be now taking Lorazepam and for those who don't know, this medication is used as a sedative.  Reading about it, I am hopeful that it helps with the mental aspect of not wanting to eat anything.  I think that my eating issues are more psychological and maybe this pill will help with that and also alleviate some of the other issues I have with the Zofran.  The first chemo nurse tried sticking my left had first, had trouble kept trying for awhile, then gave up.  She called in backup and I once again had an IV in my right hand.  Once that was done, everything went as was expected, although I was about an hour later today getting started so it seemed to go on forever.
I am really starting to struggle with the day to day task of keeping up enough calories entering my body and the mass water drinking is starting to become a chore.  My mouth is starting to be much more sensitive to temperature (hot and cold) and so I have to be careful with the temperature of things that I ingest.  I know I need to drink it, and I absolutely feel better when I drink it, so you think that would be a no-brainer.  I think that is where the mind games start creeping in.  I probably underestimated the amount that psychological issues would play in all of this.  It is non stop...I never get a break from it.  From when I get up until when I go to bed, it is a constant struggle to make sure that I do the things that I know I need to do to make this whole experience hopefully go as smoothly as possible.  Each day it becomes more difficult, but I must press on.  I need to do it for myself, but also for the other three people who are the most unfortunate to have to be around me the most.  Now that I am over halfway there I can definitely start the official countdown to completion.  I feel the road ahead will be hard, but I shall persevere and hopefully come out on the other side stronger and a better person.
I am typing this post in extreme comfort on my new adjustable bed.  For the last two years I have been sleeping on two bed wedges, one that elevates my upper body and one to elevate my legs.  They have deteriorated quite a bit and so today was the day that I went and got an adjustable base and new mattresses.  It is a split king (basically it is just two twin xl beds side by side), so we each have our own control.  Thus far it is super cool, I didn't opt for all the crazy features with the base, so I can just lift my upper body and also raise my legs.  My hope is that it helps me get better rest and allows more comfortable sleeping positions.  I shall now give it the full first night test run!  Goodnight!

NOW it begins

I have been pretty good (at least, in my opinion) about posting on a daily basis and I have purposefully left the weekends alone.  Saturday and Sunday I don't receive any treatment and I have used those two days to relax and recover at home.  I am posting today (Saturday) because I didn't do any writing yesterday.  The reason for that is because I was dealing with some rather severe discomfort and I spent the majority of the afternoon and evening curled up in the fetal position on my bed, dozing in and out of consciousness.  The nausea really hit me yesterday and I couldn't shake it.  Thus far, I have been able to do various things to either take my mind off of it or to make it somewhat bearable while I continue doing my daily activities.  Yesterday and today have been on a totally different level from what I have experienced thus far.  The bright side still is that I have yet to actually vomit and I can still find positions that lessen the overall impact of the most intense nausea sensations, but it has been getting considerably worse.  It is not really that it comes and goes either, it seems to just be a constant feeling of a sick/sour stomach that I can't completely get rid of.  Currently I can still only be up and moving around for a few minutes at a time before I have to sit or lay down to get the worst of the sensations to calm down.  I am forcing myself to eat (albeit not completely healthy AT ALL, but at least it is calories) but even drinking water has seemed like a daunting task the last couple of days.  I am still hopeful that I start to turn things around tomorrow and Monday, so I can go back into Tuesday feeling a little better and let the process begin again.
On to more pleasant thoughts...

2011 OBF

Currently going on in Portland, Oregon is the 26th annual Oregon Brewers Festival.  My brother and I (along with Robby) had the pleasure of attending this festival 2 years ago and it was an awesome beer fest.  I hope that once I am finally through with all of this crap and can move on with my life that we will again take up the task of meeting once a year at a beer festival somewhere to enjoy some beers and some good times.  The first picture is of our first day at the festival (before things took an interesting turn with a few too many full pours).  It was a great overall experience and I would recommend anyone with an interest in good beer to take a trip to Portland to experience one of the best beer cities in the US.
The other picture I feel I need to share today is of my beard in its glory days of late 2011.  This picture was from November of 2011, about a month before I got my initial diagnosis of squamous cell carcinoma.  I had been growing it out to win "Best Beard" in the Warrior Dash run outside of Austin (actually it was in Bastrop), but it was so hot and windy and dusty that we left the party after the run early and I missed out on the whole competition.  Oh well, it is still my best beard ever, so I thought I would share as I am still losing more and more of it every day.  I am definitely going to have to wear my MD Anderson id bracelet every time I go in to get treatment if I have to shave much of it off.  They will not know who I am when I first go in there.
Time to go try and eat some soup and hopefully get a few more calories in me before I fade out for the night.

Things that I could do without...

For starters, I would like to just skip Thursdays from here on out.  That would be totally ok with me if they did not happen for the next month or so.  The nausea seems to peak in the afternoon on Thursday and it is not pleasant at all.  Even with the medicine today, it was tough to deal with.  I still am trying to make myself eat through it, and the act of eating itself is not that bad, even when I am having fits with the nausea.  Most of the time it is the thought of food that really gets my stomach turning, but smells are still setting me off as well.  It seems to get worse as the day progresses, so this morning was ok...but right now it is not so good.  As long as I am sitting down, I can usually control it.  There are times when I have to close my eyes so as not to have any visual sensory input to help to get the feelings to pass.  Thus far, I have been successful in my attempts to not actually vomit, so here is to hoping that I keep that streak alive.
Radiation was again routine today, although their other machine was broken this morning so the schedule was somewhat out of whack.  Beard is still coming out if given outside assistance (pulling on it) on the left hand side, but it is not patchy enough yet to worry myself over it.  My skin underneath the beard, especially on my chin is bothering me, I don't know what that is about.  It is itchy and feels perhaps flaky?  Maybe it's a bad case of beardruff.  Whatever it is, it is slightly annoying.
Short post today, I am tired and ready to try to sleep a little tonight (hopefully).

Where to go from here?

The inevitable began to happen today, and it serves as a steadfast reminder that regardless of how I feel day in and day out, my body is being inundated with poison and there are just some things that you can't get away from.  This is one of those vanity issues that, in the long run, does not matter too much but I can't say my heart didn't break a little when it happened.  This morning, whilst engaged in the daily routine of showering and preparing for the day, I was rinsing out the shampoo from my lovely beard when I looked down to see my hands covered in hair.  That is correct, my beard is now coming out in very large amounts at the slightest tug.  Again, if this is the worst then so be it, but I really am sad to see it.  My only hope is that it is not permanent.  This is due to the radiation more than the chemo, so the left side of my face is and will be much more affected than my right.  I have already made the decision that if it starts to get very bad, I will be forced to go with either the friendly mutton chops or perhaps just a nice stand alone mustache for the remainder of my treatment.  Right now, I am in preservation mode, so I hope to maintain as little hair loss as possible but at the rate that I am losing it today, I don't know how long I can hold out.

This could be me very soon.

I took my nausea medicine all day today, and that has kept that under control.  I will still tend to get random sick feelings throughout the day and it still seems to be triggered by smells more than anything else.  The biggest issue still remains the fatigue and the tiredness all the time.  Granted it did not help that I was up way to late doing genealogy stuff, but I was still very tired today.  I got to visit with my radiation oncologist again today and that went well.  I actually like him more and more each time I have the chance to interact with him.  He does a very good job at giving the impression that he actually cares about what is going on, which helps put me at ease with everything when we are discussing the treatment.  He does think that by this time next week, I will have some worsening side effects and that I just need to stay on top of pain levels and eating.  Roger that.  
Bowen wanted to meet for lunch, so we all met at Fuddruckers for a burger, and that was a nice treat.  He had spent the morning mowing the yard for me, so he definitely earned his cheeseburger today.  Also, an unexpected surprise awaited me when I got home from work today and that was some wonderful artwork imported from San Francisco along with some cookies both produced masterfully by my youngest niece, Natalie, along with some help from her parents (thanks a bunch David and Ginny).

It's upside down, but still easy enough to interpret.

Brand new addiction

Today was round 3 for the chemo along with my usual dose of radiation.  Every day at radiation, I see the same few people that are all waiting around for their treatments and we chat about our general experiences and talk very candidly about what we are all going through.  It is actually a good thing for me every day to hear what others are going through and to find some common ground with people that are dealing with the same issues and concerns and treatments.  It is a very different world that you step in to when someone tells you that you have cancer both for you individually, but also for all those people that are close to you.  After radiation, I came back out to the waiting room and sat down with the group that I talk to everyday and we chatted about various topics, including our original diagnosis and the shock that you receive when random doctor #1 enters the room to tell you that the biopsy came back as cancer and then launches into what all they are going to do about it, when it is hard to advance your mind past the sucker-punch that you just received.  Jessica had told them that I am writing about everything in a daily blog and we talked about that a little, mainly that this is my one outlet and that I would much rather do this than actually talk about it.  I will say that everyone I have talked with is very positive about the blog and consensus seems to be that it is a good thing for me to be doing and that is nice to hear.  Anyway, along these same lines, we got to talking about the reaction people have when you start talking about all the things that you are going through.  There is usually a moment where you can tell the eyes begin to glaze over and the panicked look on their face becomes more and more evident and then you realize that they have no idea what to say in this situation and are frantically trying to come up with something positive to say.  But what is there to say?  It goes back to what I was trying to say yesterday with my reasoning for writing this blog.  I do not want sympathy nor am I looking for anyone to feel sorry for me or worry about me.  I want to present what is going on, the things that I am struggling with and what I am experiencing and thinking about on a daily basis.  I probably veered off course here again, so I will try to remain on topic.  The main point here is that I enjoy my chats in the morning with my cancer peeps, it is definitely nice to talk to others who have to endure the same (an sometimes worse) types of treatment.
Felt good today after chemo, I am still eating well.  We met up with mom and dad at Papadeaux for dinner and that was awesome, thank you Boppy!  I have to take my nausea medicine about every 8 hours, and I could definitely tell this evening when it was time for another pill.  I could take one at 5:30 and by that point I would say that it was just about time.  I started to feel nauseous and light headed around 5, but the pill begins to help me fairly quickly after I take it.  My weight is still right around where I started, and my blood pressure is rock solid.  That is one good side effect from having to see doctors ALL THE TIME now.  Doctors used to always tell me my blood pressure was somewhat high, and I would tell them that it was due to my extreme aversion to being in the doctors office.  Now it has just become routine and my blood pressure is usually right where it needs to be.  If I am going in for something that I am worried about, it can elevate, but these days I don't worry about too much.  
Now for a quick discussion of my new addiction, thanks to my mother.  She had a bunch of genealogy stuff laid out when I went to her house today so I started looking through it all.  Now I am hooked.  I now have an every increasing family tree for us that I am working on and already making some good progress.  We are all the way back to the early 1800's on my mothers maternal side of the family and I have some good leads on a lot of missing pieces.  I have always been somewhat interested in familial lineage, but sitting down and looking at it and then starting to write down names and dates makes me want to research more and more.  Speaking of that, I took a break to write this entry and now I think it is time to return to my family tree.

A case of the Mondays

The bell at MD Anderson

Now two weeks in, I can say that it will be very nice to have a two day respite from treatments on the weekends.  I am not much of a late sleeper, never have been, but it is still nice to stay in bed until 8 am for a couple of days as I go through this.  It also helped this past weekend to have a couple things to do that involved people that I truly enjoy being around.  Saturday was the local reception for Robby and Shelley to celebrate their marriage with some people who were not able to attend the actual ceremony in Grand Cayman the first week of May.  Robby brewed 15 gallons of beer for the reception and I added 10 of my own and I think everyone had a great time.  While not able to sample these glorious libations, I did have a great time and I truly cherish the time I get to spend with this group of friends that have been together for 30 (or so) years.
As far as side effects go, the main issue right now is just extreme tiredness.  I don't really have energy to do much at all.  Last week at this time, I felt much better than I do today.  I suppose they know what they are talking about when they speak of the cumulative effects as I go through treatment.  My mouth is also experiencing worsening side effects.  It is definitely drying out and tends to bother me more as I am forced to talk more.  The left side of my throat is getting progressively more sore as the days wear on.  There is now definite pain whenever I swallow, but it is only on the left hand side.  I am also starting to see why they keep telling me to do jaw exercises every day to keep my range of jaw motion at an acceptable level.  All the muscles on the left side of my neck and face are tightening up and are increasingly more difficult to move.  The left half of my tongue where my original surgery is also starting to feel a little odd.  It mainly tingles, but the left base of it is also becoming painful when I move my tongue.  My jawline is starting itch like crazy too, but that could be attributed to a bad case of the beard lice.  Rereading all of that, I want to make sure that I point out that I am not complaining at all about these things.  There are many people that have had it (and will continue to have it) far worse than I do.  I merely wish to relay these experiences as I go through them to people who care to read about them, and have a record that I can go back through if I so choose.

Looking ahead, I have chemo session #3 tomorrow along with more radiation and a blood draw first thing in the morning.  I am curious to see my blood analysis results from last week and see how they compare to the original results.  My parting picture today is of the bell that I still have yet to ship to my uncle, a bell which resided in Cat Spring, TX for all the years that I can remember and will one day soon make its way up to Omak.

2 for 1

I did not get around to writing anything yesterday, I have been pretty tired the last couple of days.  Robby and Shelley came out for dinner on Thursday and so we were busy all evening and by the time they left, I was exhausted and went straight to bed (after doing my fluoride treatment, of course).  I have been taking the nausea pills every eight hours as they instructed me and that seems to control it pretty well thus far.  The pill bottle does have a warning about the medicine possibly causing headaches, and in my case I would say that it definitely does cause them.  I guess I can choose between being nauseous or having a raging headache.  At this point I will go with the headache.
I did get some pictures of me laid out on the machine on Thursday, and I will include them with this entry.  The treatments yesterday and today were uneventful, I am usually on the table by 8:30 and in my truck now by 9:05 am.  The MD facility where I am having my treatments has this bell hanging in the hallway and each person undergoing treatment gets to ring the bell on the last day after their last treatment for all to hear.  I have seen one lady ring it, I think on my very first day and then today another guy got to ring it.  It must be such a relief to complete the course of treatment and finally get to that point and  am sure that it must feel good to do it.
I think my taste may be starting to fade now.  Everything I have eaten today has seemed bland and somewhat tasteless, but I am getting more sensitive to the temperature of food.  I had a great appetite for the majority of today, so I am still eating when I feel like it, there is just not as much enjoyment with it as I don't experience my usual taste sensations.  My mouth is also beginning to dry out more and more and the left side of my throat is definitely starting to bother me.  Things are definitely changing inside my mouth, so I need to make sure that I really stay on top of my mouth care.  Overall, I still fell decent but today I was just plain tired.  I woke up feeling tired and it continued throughout the day and when I got home from work, I went straight to my bed and took a nap.  I am definitely looking forward to not having to go in for treatments over the weekend and hopefully feeling a little better as well.
As of right now, I just made this blog public.  That means no need to log in or need for gmail accounts, it is now accessible to anyone.  The main reason for that is to try out the follow by email gadget that is now located in the upper right corner of the blog.  In theory, you can enter your email address in that box and click submit and you will get a notification email whenever I add new posts.  I have yet to try it to verify that it works, but that is the theory behind it.  

A-O River!

And then there was some mild discomfort...

My water cup

I am currently experiencing what I would say is my first real good bout of chemo induced nausea.  I had been doing pretty well today, but on the way home from work I started to feel quite queasy.  This morning, in the shower, i thought I felt what could be considered the twinges of a stomach issue so I went ahead and took my nausea pill when I got out.  Every 8 hours is how often I can take them and I had only taken one last week and I think it was also on Wednesday.  I also treated myself to a whole milk whey protein shake this morning for breakfast, so that could have been the cause of the nausea to begin with.  I bought a gallon of whole milk for two reasons...1. I absolutely love whole milk, it is like drinking cream, and 2. I thought I might start struggling to eat enough and the nutritionist/dietitian that I met with recommended using whole milk when I make my protein drinks.  My drive home from work was about 9 hours after my morning pill, so either that wore off, or my nausea just took a while to set in.  I took another pill as soon as I got home and I am currently laying in bed, supported by my two trusty bed wedges, as I type this post.  I couldn't eat much for lunch, but I did try.  I had some leftover tortellini and alfredo sauce that I thought would be a great thing to eat, but it just wasn't happening today.  I did eat a whole Fuji apple and then followed that with some peanut M&M's, so I would say that was one heck of a balanced meal.  I don't think that I have mentioned my water ration that I have put myself on while I go through this adventure, so now might be a good time to get in to it.  The recommended normal water intake for the average person per day is 8-8oz glasses.  That comes out to be 64 oz of water in a 24 hour period, which also equates to 1/2 a gallon of water.  My most recent hospital stay provided me with a very nice, insulated jug of a water cup, complete with lid and straw and it has been my very best friend since I was release a few weeks ago.  It holds 32 oz of water at a time, and I currently fill it 4 to 6 times per day.  That comes out to anywhere between 1 and 1.5 gallons of water per day that I am consuming.  They told me to drink plenty of water, so that is one controllable factor in this treatment I am definitely going to hold up on.
Radiation went smoothly, enough so that I totally forgot to meet with my doctor afterwards as I am supposed to do on Wednesdays.  I was already at work and was clearing all of my reminders when I noticed the one reminding me to meet with the doctor.  Oh well...I would imagine that it probably happens routinely around there as people come and go and get used to their usual routines.  A quick email later, I was rescheduled to meet with the doctor tomorrow instead, and since my doctor is not even here this week it will be with a substitute doc anyway.  I finally took a picture of my mask to share, with an assist by the lovely Linda, one of my radiation techs.  She sets me up and runs the machine every morning when I come in.  Tomorrow she is going to take a picture for me when I am all strapped in to the table and ready for treatment so that will be another good one to pass along.

And now for something that I get a kick out of...

I was perusing my blood laboratory results from last week (from my first day of chemo, prior to treatment), just looking at all the results.  The document lists a bunch of different chemical analyses from the blood samples they took and gives my measured value and also lists the normal value range.  So I am looking through all the different things that they are measuring and I come to on called "uric acid serum".  Mine is highlighted in red and lists it as being high for that particular substance.  I wondered exactly what this was and why mine would be high, so I did as any other well rounded researcher would and google searched for uric acid serum.  The very first result led me to a definition and some possible causes for a high reading.  

I leave you with the following excerpt from the random medical website I found and I also challenge you to really dig deep in your knowledge of me to guess which of the 6 listed items you think my high uric acid level could be attributed to...

"Uric acid is a chemical created when the body breaks down substances called purines. Purines are found in some foods and drinks, such as liver, anchovies, mackerel, dried beans and peas and beer."

Chemosocks

Chemosocks

A big thanks to Kristina and her two girls for my new loungewear and CHEMOSOCKS!  Three new pairs of awesomely comfortable socks that I can wear during my three hour chemo sessions.  I kicked it off today with the blue pair and I must say they made the day go pretty well.  I was in and out of radiation in about the new normal time, 20 minutes or so.  Before that, I had blood drawn for analysis and that, too, went very smoothly.  The guy that sticks me for the blood draw is good at what he does and it goes very quickly.  Two vials of blood and I was done.  I logged in to my MD Anderson account and checked my blood results from last week.  It was interesting to read through the various results on blood chemistry and then google what it means.  I had some things that were high and some low, but most indicators were in the normal range.  I am looking forward to talking with the medical oncologist about what it all means and also see how the numbers change over the weeks as I continue with treatment.  
I felt great this morning and had a whey protein and milk breakfast and then followed that with some bacon and eggs.  I felt like that was a good start to the day and I am trying to to live by the recommendation of when you feel like you can eat and want to eat, then eat.  It was good to have a solid breakfast and maybe that can help me delay my chemo response or perhaps lessen it.  
Once complete with bloodwork and radiation, it was time to head upstairs and check in for chemo.  After a short wait, they called my name and I was off to get my temperature, blood pressure, and weight checked and then head off to my assigned room.  I was in room 4 today, which was a mirrored setup of the room I was in last week.  Still a comfortable setup.  I had a different nurse today than last week, I didn't even see the nurse I had last week.  She put the IV in the top of my right hand, which I was not a big fan of, but it definitely worked to get everything into my body.  Again this week, there was some nausea IV medicine and a steroid prior to the Cisplatin.  I think I felt less this week than last when they finally did run the chemo drug through me.  I would way that I felt a little more tired after it was administered, but that could just be me over thinking the whole situation.  Nothing really new to mention now that I have completed two full chemo treatments.  I have not experienced much nausea this afternoon or evening and I am still able to eat well.  I still actually feel pretty good this evening, so I hope that holds true for the rest of the week.